Kisumu innovator transforms fish skin into eco-friendly leather for global fashion

In Kisumu, the story of fish is as old as the city itself.

The glistening waters of Lake Victoria have fed families for generations, their bounty sustaining livelihoods across the region.

Tilapia and Nile Perch arrive daily in heaps, ready for markets and restaurants. But for years, once filleted for the frying pan, the skins, scales, guts, and trimmings were simply discarded, left to rot or pile up as waste.

For Newton Owino, however, that "waste" was a resource waiting to be discovered.

Today, in a workshop not far from the lake, Owino turns fish skin into high-quality leather, an innovation that has not only reshaped his own life, but also reimagined what sustainable fashion can look like.

"Fish skin is not waste; it's my raw material," he says, holding up a gleaming piece of tanned hide. "People used to laugh and ask, how can you make leather from fish? But once they touch it, once they see the jackets, the belts, the shoes, their doubts vanish."

The process is as fascinating. After carefully stripping flesh and scales from the fish, Owino processes the skins into leather, stronger and more durable than many traditional hides. Unlike cowhide, whose fibres run in one direction, fish leather fibres crisscross like a basket weave, giving it surprising tensile strength.

"The chewy part of the fish, which is collagen, is used as glue. This is what bonds the leather and the sole," he explains, demonstrating how the material is pieced together for sandals and boots.

Instead of toxic chemicals, he relies on banana pseudo-stems to tan the leather, a method that keeps his process eco-friendly. Even the leftover fibres from the banana stems are repurposed into sturdy bags.

The results are stunning: jackets, shoes, boots, caps, and belts, each with unique patterns left by the natural skin pockets of the fish.

"At first, it was very hard to convince people. They thought fish leather was weak, or that it would smell," he says with a smile. "But now, our biggest markets are in Europe and America. That's where most of our exports go."

Stronger than it looks

For skeptics, the leather made from fish skin is tanned and cured to make it strong and resistant to wear. It functions like other leathers.

When fish is tanned, the scales are taken off. On leather, you can see a pattern made by the skin pockets left on the skin of fish like Baltic and Atlantic salmon. The scales on burbot skin are very small and give the leather a beautiful, varied texture.

Fish leather is also thicker than other leathers, and also stronger.

Wallets entirely made of fish skin leather are an excellent example of how durable something can be. It's common for these wallets to last more than ten years because it is thinner than most leathers made from mammals.

The leather does not smell either, as the fish smell is taken out in the early stages of tanning, turning skin into leather. When the process is done, the leather smells like other leathers.

Beyond leather

Fish skins aren't his only canvas. Walk into his workshop and you'll see an unusual mix of material.

The hair extensions, braids, and weaves that often end up as trash? He recycles them into colourful mats and carpets.

Owino has also ventured into sericulture, the rearing of silkworms to produce silk, which he exports to Asia, particularly Japan. Locally, the silk finds its way into neckties and other high-quality textiles.

"We developed this to fill the gaps in the textile industry, which has long lacked raw materials," he says.

Owino's path to fish leather was not accidental. A registered private scientific researcher, he began experimenting years ago, determined to find ways of adding value to what others dismissed as waste.

"I had to train my own staff from scratch," he recalls. "Nobody here knew how to tan fish leather. Even for sericulture, there were no trained people. I had to learn, then teach."

His perseverance paid off. Today, Owino is not only a businessman, but a symbol of what innovation rooted in sustainability can achieve.